Everyone Worth Knowing (34 page)

Who needed someone that shallow, anyway? I was just

working myself up to start a list of his many, many flaws (none of

which were immediately apparent, but which certainly must exist

somewhere) when my cell phone rang. It was Elisa, probably calling,

as usual, to ask obsessively detailed questions about when,

where, why, and with whom I'd last seen Philip, so I screened it

and approached the maitre d'. The phone rang again mere seconds

later, and even though I switched it to vibrate, she sent a text message

that read: 911-
CALL IMMEDIATELY.

"Bette? Hey, have you found them yet?" Michael asked, walking

toward me, looking haggard and slightly miserable. Penelope had

told me he was on yet another huge M&A deal. All-nighters four

days and running.

"No, are we the first ones here?" I kissed him on the cheek and

thought about how long it'd been since I'd seen him. Weeks and

weeks; so long I couldn't remember. "Where's Megu?"

"She's at the hospital. I think Pen said they might all have a private

table in the back, so let's go there."

"Perfect." I took the arm he offered and had an odd feeling of

homecoming. "You know, it's been forever since we've all hung

out. What are you doing afterward? Why don't we talk Pen into

going to the Black Door for a drink or six?"

He smiled even though it looked like it took all his energy and

nodded. "Definitely. We're all already in the same place, and when

the hell does that ever happen? Let's do it."

The table looked to seat about eighteen or twenty, but just as I

was saying my hellos to Penelope's father, my phone began to vibrate

again.

"I'm so sorry, please excuse me," I said to Penelope's dad and

bolted toward the door again to turn it off. Elisa again. Christ, what

could be so important that she needed to take the full-stalk approach?

I waited for it to stop buzzing and then flipped it open to

turn it off, but she must have dialed again because I heard her

voice emanating from my palm.

"Bette? Is that you? Bette, it's crucial."

"Hey, listen, this really isn't a good time for me. I'm at my

friend's—"

"You've got to get down here right away, Kelly's freaking out

because—"

"Elisa, you didn't even let me finish. It's eight-thirty on a Saturday

night and I'm just about to start dinner at the Four Seasons

with my friend and her entire family and it's really important, so

I'm sure you can handle whatever Kelly's freaking out about." I

congratulated myself on being firm and setting boundaries, something

my mother had been trying to teach me from age six.

She was breathing heavily at this point, and I heard the faint

clinking of glasses in the background. "Sorry, hon, but Kelly's not

taking no tonight. She's at dinner with the BlackBerry people right

now at Vento and she needs us to meet them at Soho House by

nine-thirty, latest."

"Impossible. You know I'd be there if I could. It's mandatory

that I stay here for at least the next couple hours," I said, hearing a

waver in my voice. "I mean, nine-thirty is ridiculously early, and I

don't understand why, if she expected us to meet them, it has to

be on a Saturday night, or why she couldn't have mentioned it beforehand."

"Look, I hear you, but there's no way out. You're in charge of

the party, Bette! They came into town early and Kelly thought a

dinner meeting would appease them, but apparently they want to

meet you . . . and Philip. Tonight. Since the party is so close, and

apparently they're nervous."

"Philip? You can't be serious."

"You
are
dating him, Bette. And he
did
agree to host this event

for us," she said, sounding like a bossy older sister. I saw Penelope

approaching me out of the corner of my eye and knew I was being

horrifically rude.

"Elisa, I really—"

"Bette, honey, I don't want to pull rank here, but your job's on

the line. I'll help as much as possible, but you've
got to be here.
I'll

send a car to the Four Seasons in thirty minutes. Get in it."

As the call cut off, Penelope threw her arms around my neck.

"I love your plan!" she said, grabbing my hand and walking me

toward the table. I overheard Mr. Wainwright talking loudly about

a lawsuit he was overseeing to a rather subdued, dignified-looking

woman, and I wondered if Penelope might not want to save her

grandmother from her future father-in-law.

"Plan?"

"Yes, Michael told me about the reunion at the Black Door

tonight. Such a good call! It's been forever since we've done that

and"—she looked around—"I'll need to drink heavily after this.

You have no idea what Avery's mother did tonight. Took my mom

and me aside and presented me, quite proudly, with a copy of
Fete

Accompli!: The Ultimate Guide to Creative Entertaining
and the entire

Barefoot Contessa cookbook series. Oh, but it gets better. Not

only did she highlight all of her suggestions for dinner-party

themes, she also made notes by all of Avery's favorite dishes so I

may properly instruct the cook. She made a special point of letting

me know that as a general rule, he doesn't like any food that

should be consumed with sticks, in her words."

"Sticks?"

"Chopsticks. She said they 'confuse him.'"

"That's fantastic. She sounds like a real treat."

"Yep. My mother just stood there, nodding. She did manage to

comfort Avery's mom by pointing out how easy it would be for us

to find household help in California, what with the hordes of Mexican

immigrants. The 'promised land of cheap labor,' I think were

her exact words."

"Let's just remember never to allow our parents in the same

room again, okay?" I said. "They'd have a field day with this one.

You remember what a disaster it was last time?"

"Are you kidding?" she said. "How could I not?"

We'd cleverly kept our two sets of parents from being in the same

place through four years of college, but during graduation it had

proven impossible. Each was curious about the other and after much

prodding from both mothers, Penelope and I had grudgingly scheduled

a dinner for everyone on Saturday night. The stress began with

the restaurant selection: my parents were rallying to try the all-organic

raw-food bar that had published a number of famous cookbooks,

while Penelope's parents insisted on going to their usual place when

they visited—Ruth's Chris Steak House. We compromised on some

high-end, pan-Asian chain that displeased everyone, and things only

spiraled downward from there. The restaurant didn't serve my

mother's type of tea or Penelope's father's favorite cabernet. As far as

conversation topics went, politics, careers, and future plans for the

graduates were out, since there were no shared opinions or ideas

whatsoever. My father ended up talking to Avery for most of the meal

and then making fun of him later; I spoke to my mother, Penelope

talked only to hers, and her father and brother exchanged the occasional

sentence or two in between gulps from the three bottles of red

wine they killed together. It had ended as awkwardly as it started,

with everyone eyeing each other suspiciously and wondering what

their daughters saw in one another. Penelope and I had dropped

them all at their respective hotels, hit the bars immediately, and proceeded

to drunkenly imitate each one, all while swearing to never repeat

that evening.

"Come here—talk to my father for me, will you? It's been a few

decades since he's socialized outside the office and he doesn't

seem to know what to do." She seemed in reasonably high spirits,

and I wondered how to tell her that I could only stay through

drinks because I had to go to a party with the gorgeous bad boy I

was supposedly dating.

"Pen, I'm so sorry to do this and I acknowledge that it's the

shittiest, most selfish thing in the whole world, but I just got a call

from work and I have absolutely positively no choice but to go because

I'm in charge of this particular project and there are people

in from out of town that my boss is currently with and she's insisting

that I meet them and even though I told her that I was at

something really, really important she basically threatened my

job)—through a third party, of course—if I'm not downtown in

under an hour and I argued and argued, but she was adamant, so

I'm planning to get down there and back as quickly as possible

and of course I'm still up for the Black Door if you guys don't

mind waiting for me." Stop. Deep breath. Ignore death look on

Penelope's face. "I'm sorry!" I wailed loud enough to cause a few

of the waiters to glance in our direction. I somehow managed to

ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach, Michael's surprised look

from a few feet away, and the reproachful stare from Penelope's

mother for making the commotion.

"When do you have to leave?" Penelope asked calmly, her expression

revealing nothing.

"In a half-hour. They're sending a car."

She unconsciously twisted the small diamond stud in her right ear

and gazed at me. "Do what you need to do, Bette. I understand."

"You do?" I asked, not quite believing her, but hearing no

anger in her voice.

"Of course. I know you want to be here, and sure, I'm disappointed,

but I know you wouldn't go unless it was really important."

"I'm so sorry, Pen. I promise to make it up to you."

"Don't worry about it. Go on, take that seat over there next to

Avery's cute single friend and at least enjoy the time you have."

She was saying all the right things, but the tightness of her mouth

made her words seem forced.

Avery's decidedly uncute single friend immediately started reminiscing

about his wild and crazy frat days at Michigan while I

quickly worked my way through drinks two and three. One of

Penelope's friends from the bank, a girl I didn't know when I was

there but who seemed to be with Pen all the time now, made an

impromptu toast that was adorably funny and charming. I tried to

suppress my bitterness when Penelope threw her arms around the

girl, and I insisted to myself that it was my paranoia speaking and

that no one was staring at me, thinking me an awful friend. The

half-hour passed in a split second. I thought it better to steal away

than make a big production and explain myself to everyone, so I

tried to catch Penelope's eye but simply left when it seemed like

she was deliberately avoiding me.

On the sidewalk, I offered a dollar to a well-dressed man for a

cigarette, but he refused and tossed me one for free, adding a pitiful

headshake. There was no car in sight and I thought about going

back in for a few more minutes, but just then a very familiarlooking

lime green Vespa pulled up alongside the curb.